


carry you with every breath i take

by flooded_in_the_sky



Series: i want the flame but not the burning [3]
Category: Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Established Relationship, F/F, Pet Names, i just wanted more rose tico content ok thats it, implied/mentioned character death, slight references to resistance reborn
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-26
Updated: 2020-01-26
Packaged: 2021-02-27 07:15:13
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,056
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22413070
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/flooded_in_the_sky/pseuds/flooded_in_the_sky
Summary: As Finn and Poe leave Kef Bir, Rose is on base dealing with fallout.
Relationships: Kaydel Ko Connix/Rose Tico
Series: i want the flame but not the burning [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1603390
Comments: 2
Kudos: 11





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> !! this takes place between the two previous fics in this series, but you don't need to read them to understand this one if you want !!

Leia Organa was maybe one of the most important people in Rose’s life, aside from Kaydel and Finn. Paige had always been number one, no contest there, but she couldn’t exactly talk to the space her sister once occupied and get a reply. She’d tried. So slowly and painfully moved on, realized she didn’t really want to kiss Finn, that it was more a heat of the moment thing than anything else, realized she really  _ did _ want to kiss Kaydel, and continued to work with everything she had in her to end the First Order. 

The day Leia promoted her to commander of the engineering corps was, without a doubt, the best day of her life. After sitting through the rest of the meeting ready to bounce out of her seat, Rose ran nearly the entire base looking for Finn and Rey to tell them. Their response to the news was to immediately sandwich her in a hug and tell her at least five times how proud they were. Kaydel had done the same, just with more kisses, and really, Rose didn’t have a problem with that at all. 

Now, though, Rose couldn’t stop thinking about that meeting all those months ago, when Leia’d told her that she was smart and capable enough to handle the whole engineering corps, all the weapons for the Resistance. She couldn’t stop thinking about how up until maybe an hour ago, Leia was the strongest person she knew, and that if somebody told her what would unfold she would’ve tazed them for telling the worst joke in the history of the galaxy. 

“We need to regroup,” Commander D’Acy told her quietly. “Meet me by the monitors.” Rose nodded in reply, taking one last look at the white sheet Maz had draped over her body before turning out of the little cave and trying to stop crying. Instead of meeting with the other commanders, Rose took a detour for her little corner of the base. 

* * *

“Come on, guys, we  _ need _ you,” Rose murmured to herself as she dropped her face in her hands. The scanners were still blank, and the Falcon hadn’t returned any comms. 

“Rose? You in here?” Kaydel peered around the corner and found her at the desk, eyes red. “Babe, they’re looking for you. You have to go out there.”

“They have to come back, Kay. Without the map-thing they went out there to find, we were already screwed, but now? Now, we can’t go on.” Rose shut her eyes. “If they don’t come back, we are  _ going _ to lose.”

Kaydel took a deep breath as she sat down beside Rose, rubbing small circles on her back. “We can’t give up now. We’re so close, you know? And they’ll come back. Dameron is too damn stubborn to let anything happen out there, or to us.”

Rose snorted. “You’re right about that.”

“I know. That’s why I know that you need to get over there and help them figure out what to do next. I’ll be with you every step of the way if you want.” 

“Thank you.” Rose looked at her for a moment before kissing her. “Okay. I can do this.”

“You can do this,” Kaydel said as she stood up and took her hand. 

“I can do this.”

“You can do this!”

“Yes. Okay.” As they walked to the monitors at the center of the base, Rose took deep breaths. “I love you. I can’t remember if I’ve told you today.”

“I can’t either, but it doesn’t hurt to say it more than once. I love you, too.”

* * *

“We’re all here?” D’Acy asked as Rose and Kaydel slipped to the front of the small crowd. “Good. It appears the general was prepared for this situation, and did name a successor.” She revealed a folder with a few sheets of paper inside. “As well as being stored in her personal system, which we cannot currently access, she left these files in the event that she was incapacitated. The person she hands leadership over to is Commander Poe Dameron.” Her breath hitched as she read, and Rose took Kaydel’s hand.

“He’s off-world, what are we supposed to do?” a voice from further back asked.

“We tell him when he comes back,” Rose cut in firmly.

“And what are we supposed to do if he doesn’t?” the same voice asked, and Rose swallowed the lump in her throat at the thought. 

“We will cross that bridge when we get there, Commander Gartfran. For now, we must assume that the Millennium Falcon will return.”

“We don’t have the time to-”

“They are coming back,” Rose snapped, and whipped around to face the other commander. “They are coming. I’ve spent the last hour checking the scanners.”

“And?”  
“Nothing yet. But they will be back. If nothing else, I believe that.”

“If they don’t come back soon, we will have to make a decision as to who will lead the Resistance. However, until that time, Poe Dameron is the acting general, and we’ll wait for him to return before we move forward with any new plans of attack or defense.” With that, the meeting was seemingly adjourned, D’Acy heading in the direction of her office and the other commanders scattering. Rose felt cold, as though she was back on Crait in those ships that barely held themselves together as the entirety of the Resistance held its breath and tried not to be blasted to bits. 

“They’re gonna come back, you said it yourself,” Kaydel said and led her away. “We just need to keep an eye on the scanner.”

“Right. Right, they’ll be back. And when they get here I’m gonna kill Finn for making us worry.” 

“I’ll get Dameron. We’ll tag-team it.”

“What about Rey?”

“Oh, she’d kick our asses, no questions asked. We’ll just leave her be.”

“Sounds like a good plan.” Rose smiled a little at the absurdity of it all as they trudged back to her nook and sat down at the hard stone bench. “Actually, can you wait here?”

“Yeah. Take as long as you need, babe.”

“I’ll be right back, I think. Love you.”

“Love you.”

* * *

The area where Leia had been laid to rest had cleared out by the time Rose came back. She knew there would be time for mourning later and that right now the fate of the Resistance rested on her doing her job, but this was something she couldn’t get past. The least she owed Leia was one last thank you.

“I don’t know if you can hear me or not,” Rose started as she sat down in front of the table. The white sheet didn’t move. “I don’t know how the Force works, or if that still applies. Anyway. I just wanted to say thank you. For everything. You helped me feel like I still had a family after Paige-” Rose stopped short, wiping at her eyes and taking in a shaky breath. “After Paige, and Crait, and Ryloth, and everything that led us here. You made me a commander because you  _ trusted me _ , and I promise I’m going to do everything I can to keep that trust now.” She sniffed a little, and stood up. “I think that’s all I wanted to say. Thank you, General.” With that, she left the cave and headed back for Kaydel and that damn scanner.

“Hurry,” she mumbled, taking a cursory glance at the sky. 


	2. Chapter 2

Rose hugged Finn fiercer than she’d ever hugged anybody, with the exception of Paige and maybe Kaydel.

“You ass,” she muttered into his jacket. “Would it kill you to answer a comm?”

“The Falcon was busted to hell and back,” Finn replied. “We barely made it here.”

“Good. I was worried.” She pulled back and looked at him for a second. “Wait, where’s Rey?”

“Don’t know.”

“Well, that’s certainly not ideal.”

“No, not really.”

Rose took a deep breath. “Okay, I need to talk to Poe. Some stuff happened while you guys were gone.” She looked around for a second and saw Commander D’Acy walking towards him. “Is she-yep.”

“Is she what?” Finn asked, watching Poe.

“She’s telling him.”

“What?”

“The general passed away, Finn. Leia’s gone.”

Finn stared at Rose for a second, looking like he’d seen a ghost, which, given the day’s events, wouldn’t have been out of the question. “That’s what it was.”

“Huh?”

“Don’t worry about it.” Finn turned his gaze back to where Poe had been standing, but he was gone. “Where’d he go?”

“Probably where she was laid. She named him general in her place.”

“Really?”

“Yep.”

“I should go talk to him, shouldn’t I?”

“Give him a minute. He’s got a lot to take in, and you know how he is.”

“Right.” 

* * *

Commander D’Acy called another meeting some time after the Falcon landed, but Poe was nowhere to be seen as they gathered.

“Where the hell is Dameron? He’s the one running this show now, he can’t disappear whenever he feels like it.”

“General Dameron is grieving. I know we don’t have much time, but we’ve all had some. He deserves a bit, too,” D’Acy said. 

“I can go talk to him. He’ll snap back, he just needs a tick,” Rose said, and D’Acy nodded. 

“Go. We’ll be here.”

Rose broke away from the main group and headed for the cave. 

* * *

“Hey.”

Poe startled, and looked up at her. “Oh. Hey.”

“Can I sit?”

Poe shrugged by way of answer, and Rose took that as a yes. 

“I know I only have an inkling of how you feel right now,” she started. “She was important to you. You were closer with her than any of us were.”

“I can’t do this.”

“What?”

“I can’t lead the Resistance.” He set his face in his hands. “I can’t do this. Leia chose wrong.”

“She sure as hell didn’t, she chose _you_. You’re one of maybe two people I would trust to lead us. And you know none of us know what we’re doing. How can we?”

“I know that, but she also had a whole other war’s worth of experience, and she,” Poe paused, before completely switching thoughts. “I can’t do this alone.”

“You’re not alone. You have Finn, and me, and all the other commanders. We’re not gonna hang you out to dry.”

A few minutes passed in silence, and Rose gave his shoulder a squeeze as she stood up. “Take as long as you need. We don’t have much time, but. Do what you need to.” She left him sitting, head bowed behind the table and headed back for the cluster of commanders only to find them gathered around the monitors nearby. 

“What’s going on?” she asked, worming her way to the front. “What is that?”

“X-wing, but the ID doesn’t match any in our register,” Beaumont replied. 

“How can it not?”

“Don’t know. Somebody’s checking again, but I looked myself the first time and there wasn’t a match.”

“That’s impossible,” Rose mumbled. “Do we know where it’s going?”

“No idea. There isn’t supposed to be anything in that direction.”

Rose fought her way back to the edge of the group and ran for the cave. Sure, she’d told Poe to take his time, but that was before whatever the hell this was. She stopped short when she saw him talking to Finn, looking considerably better than he had a bit ago. He caught her eye and gave a look that said _give me a minute_ , and she crossed her arms. As badly as she wanted things to work out between Finn and Poe, this was quite possibly the worst time they could’ve picked to talk.

“Idiots,” Rose said under her breath as she walked up to them. “I hate to break this up, guys, really, but we have a situation.”

“What?” Poe asked. 

“Come see for yourself.” They ran back to the monitor and pushed to the front. 

“That’s Luke Skywalker’s X-wing,” Poe said. 

“Why do you know that?” Rose asked. “Never mind. Where’s it going?”

Finn and Poe looked at each other for a second before realization washed over both of them. “Exegol,” Poe said firmly. 

“Rey.”

“She’s leading us right to them.” Poe watched the blinking icon travel further across the screen towards the empty space on the map. 

“Well, then. What’s our next step, General?” Rose asked.

**Author's Note:**

> hello! i wrote this a few weeks ago and never got around to posting it, which is a shame because we all need more rose tico in our lives. title is from like a river runs by bleachers. this is my [tumblr](https://ccerebral-thunderr.tumblr.com/) if you want to stop by. thank you for reading!


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